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Saturday, September 5, 2009

Weekly Report-Week 9

We're still trying to figure out our schedule now that public school has started. It doesn't help that D-Man has been sleeping in until at least 8:45. Friday, he didn't wake up until 9:15. He must be going through a growth spurt because he's been going to sleep before 9 (bedtime at 8). He normally wakes up between 7:45 and 8. This has been cutting into our morning, so we aren't finishing math and LA until 12-1. That's fine except that D-Man just doesn't focus well that late. So, we're still working on it.

Here's the rundown:

Math: D-Man learned two exciting new concepts this week. Yes, he really was excited. First, we learned about quarters. I thought this was going to hard, but he got it right away. This was one instance when manipulatives came in handy. He doesn't normally like the clutter of manipulatives, but it does help him to understand a new concept occasionally. In this instance, we paired up a quarter with two dimes and a nickel, two quarters with a half dollar, and four quarters with a dollar. He got it immediately.

The second concept that promted him to bring me his math book on Saturday was learning about 3-D shapes. The book only listed cylindars, spheres, and cones. We got those down and then dove into the rest of our 3-D shapes set. There are 10 in all. They suggested a couple of games in the package, so we played those for a few minutes. Here's a pic of D-Man figuring out which shapes are suitable for tower building and which are not.

Language Arts: We did better with SWR this week. I'm trying to figure out ways for D-Man to read his words more often without using his learning log. He just doesn't like reading out of the learning log. This week, we used his word box. I pulled out all of the action verbs and made a game out of reading the cards. Instead of just reading them out loud to me, he had to act them out. He loved this game! Next time, I'll get C-Monster involved. He can't read all of those words yet, but he'll follow whatever D-Man does. In fact, Little-J will enjoy the show too. My plan is to do something similar with the prepositions, nouns, and pronouns.

D-Man got a 90% on his spelling test for the third week in a row. He misspelled 'your' which wasn't surprising because he misspelled 'you' two weeks ago. We retested 'you' this week and he got it right, but forgot the connection between it and 'your.' He did think about it. He spelled it 'yoor' using the 1st sound of /oo/ instead of the 3rd sound of /ou/. He also got all of his other review words correct which shows me that he's learning from his mistakes. He is really pushing me to try 20 words per week. I think that we'll give it a try when we start list F in two weeks.

Sonlight: We finished up week 16 this week. Nothing real special to report here. Great read-alouds.

Science: We finished up the Berenstain Bear's Book of Science and Nature this week. The last portion was about energy. D-Man was sad we finished it, but happier when I told him we'd start it all over next week. We'll just read it along-side our other science readings. I found this science experiment on the pbskids website. So cool. It ties in matter with energy.

My three little scientists

Library Trip: We made a trip to the library this week. Although, I love Sonlight's P4/5 program for Kindergarten, we need more reading. I consider this our pleasure reading. I'd like the boys to get into a habit of always reading for learning (school) and for pleasure. I have a list of books called 1000 good books. I'd like for us to get through all of these books during our schooling years. The list splits the books up into grade categories. We'll certainly be able to meet my goal for the primary elementary books. I put a few of those books on hold and picked up the books that I'd placed on hold last week. I told each boy that they could pick 1-2 books themselves. D-Man picked up a book and read its title, "Frog's Best Friend." I love to see that.

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I'm a child of the Lord just trying to figure out how best to raise these four little boys He's given me and loving almost every minute of it. It's amazing how much He reveals to me through this journey...and I'm supposed to be the one teaching.